"We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people." – John Fitzgerald Kennedy

I believe that our Blessed Lady has a special intention for the Credo. Under her influence I always treat it as more than a kind of public profession. It is primarily a prayer because Faith is a theological virtue. “I belief Lord. Help me in my unbelief.” I think it would be better for it to be sung on the special occasions of re-dedication. The English Credo is the Mother’s Milk of sung prayers; babies can sing it. (Latin would be wonderful, but be all things to all people.) Accordingly, I have moved English to the top.

Smoking cannabis can induce psychosis-like effects, similar to the symptoms people diagnosed with schizophrenia endure, scientists have said.
While past research as come this this conclusion in the past, the mechanisms underlying these effects are less clear.

Now, a team of scientists at Yale School of Medicine have found the active ingredient in marijuana, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-THC) increases random neural activity, known as neural noise, in the brains of healthy drug-users.

Their findings suggest increased neural noise may play a role in the psychosis-like effects of cannabis.
Dr Deepak D’Souza, a professor of psychiatry at Yale, said: ‘At doses roughly equivalent to half or a single joint, delta-9-THC produced psychosis-like effects and increased neural noise in humans.’
First author of the study, Dr Jose Cortes-Briones, a postdoctoral associate in psychiatry at Yale, added: ‘The dose-dependent and strong positive relationship between these two findings suggest that the psychosis-like effects of cannabis may be related to neural noise which disrupts the brain’s normal information processing.’

Researchers studied the effects of delta-9-THC on electrical brain activity in 24 human subjects, who took part in a three-day study.

During the experiments, they received two doses of intravenous delta-9-THC or a placebo in a double-blind, randomised, cross-over and counterbalanced design.

If confirmed, the link between neural noise and psychosis could shed light on the biology of some of the symptoms associated with schizophrenia.

Dr John Krystal, editor of Biological Psychiatry, the journal in which the study is published, said the research marks an important part of the debate over whether cannabis should be legalised.
He said: ‘This interesting study suggests a commonality between the effects on the brain of the major active ingredient in marijuana and symptoms of schizophrenia.

‘The impairment of cortical function by delta-9-THC could underlie some of the cognitive effects of marijuana.

‘Not only does this finding aid our understanding of the processes underlying psychosis, it underscores an important concern in the debate surrounding medical and legalised access to marijuana.’

SEATTLE (CBS Seattle)– A new study on marijuana use warns the highly-potent strains of the drug available on the market today could cause brain damage or even lead to psychosis.

British researchers studied the brains of heavy marijuana users in South London.

“If you look at the corpus callosum, what we’re seeing is a significant difference in the white matter between those who use high potency cannabis and those who never use the drug, or use the low-potency drug,” study co-author Paola Dazzan toldThe Guardian.

White matter in the brain transmits signals from one region of the cerebrum to another and from the cerebrum to other parts of the brain. When the white matter is impaired or damaged, it can block communication between the right and left hemispheres of the brain.

Dazzan blames tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in pot. While most marijuana contains onlu 2-4 percent of THC, about 100 high-potency brands of pot contain as much as 14 percent THC.

“What we can say is if it’s high potency, and if you smoke frequently, your brain is different from the brain of someone who smokes normal cannabis, and from someone who doesn’t smoke cannabis at all,” explained Dazzan.

Dr. Romina Mizrahi, director of the Focus on Youth Psychosis Prevention clinic at the Center for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, who has studied marijuana, told Digital Journal the damage can be serious.

“Teenagers think that cannabis is harmless,” she warned. “It is not. And for some people, it’s particularly dangerous.”

Item: When the Occupy Wall Street / 99% movement was getting into high gear, I publicly speculated that the force behind the agitations was George Soros, the man who made $1 billion betting against the British Pound. I searched for the term “George Soros Occupy Wall St”, with no meaningful results. Three days later, “George Soros Funds Groups Behind Occupy Wall St” could be found on some media outlets.

So how do we get so thoroughly fooled, so long and hard? Here’s a clue: We are being manipulated by opinion manufacturing specialists who have an extremely insightful understanding of human foibles. Here’s a diagram that perhaps oversimplifies the issue, but at least it can get us started talking about it:

General Smedley Darlington Butler was a soldier’s soldier, he cleaned up a WW1 army camp in Belgium that was a death trap. (This was when influenza took millions of lives.)

So I ask my old Aunt Mary what she remembers about him. “He’s a bum.” This was when Philadelphia was more corrupt than Chicago, Butler was appointed police commissioner, he was “no good Texas toiler paper (wouldn’t take crap off anyone).”

The mass-brainwashing propaganda machine flooded the press, nationwide (Aunty had never been near Philly) with negative stories.

He was a Friend (a Quaker). When he’d go home & talk with his Dad (a Congressman), it was all “thee” and “thou”. But in khaki, he was one tough s.o.b., “Old Gimlet Eye” was what the men called him.

My old sister Sheila watched President Lyndon Baines Johnson give a speech about The Gulf of Tonkin Incident. She says “he was gripping the pedestal so hard his knuckles were white, I knew he was lying”.

I was made spiritual father, but never allowed to fulfill that role, until now.

I’ve identified the legacy I want to convey, and just now have found the key to delivering it.

This permission has finally been attained because of the fact that the subject is neither on the right not the left, because forces controlling massive blocks of public opinion are above such distinctions.“That’s the age we live in. We don’t want to read anymore, we don’t want to find out why, we just go, are people angry? I want to be angry,” he said. “And it’s a mob mentality that’s not progressive and it’s not conducive to us getting to the truth of anything.”Comedians Dump Campus Gigs: When Did Colleges Lose Their Sense of Humor?, Matt Donnelly and Kathy Zerbib on August 23, 2015

If The “Conservatives” Had A More Coherent, Political Gangster Force–As They Did in 2000–The Ruling Elite Would Have Supported “Conservatism”.

The Angel appeared to the children at the Loca do Cabeço, in the fall of 1906. He was “holding a chalice in his hands, with a host above it from which some drops of blood were falling into the Sacred vessel.” The Angel left the chalice and host suspended in the air, and prostrated himself upon the ground with the children and prayed the following prayer with them three times:

Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I adore You profoundly, and I offer you the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and indifference with which He Himself is offended. And through the infinite merits of His most Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of You the conversion of poor sinners. Amen.

The Angel then rose, and taking the host he gave it to Lucy, and to Jacinta and Francisco he gave the contents of the chalice, saying as he did so: “Take and drink the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men. Repair their crimes and console your God.” Then he prostrated himself once more with the children and repeated the prayer to the Most Holy Trinity three times, then disappeared.

My sweet Lord, look with mercy upon your people and especially upon the mystical body of your Church. Greater glory is given to your name for pardoning a multitude of your creatures than if I alone were pardoned for my great sins against your majesty. It would be no consolation for me to enjoy your life if your holy people stood in death. For I see that sin darkens the life of your bride the Church – my sin and the sins of others.

It is a special grace I ask for, this pardon for the creatures you have made in your image and likeness. When you created man, you were moved by love to make him in your own image. Surely only love could so dignify your creatures. But I know very well that man lost the dignity you gave him; he deserved to lose it, since he had committed sin.

Moved by love and wishing to reconcile the human race to yourself, you gave us your only-begotten Son. He became our mediator and our justice by taking on all our injustice and sin out of obedience to your will, eternal Father, just as you willed that he take on our human nature. What an immeasurably profound love! Your Son went down from the heights of his divinity to the depths of our humanity. Can anyone’s heart remain closed and hardened after this?

We image your divinity, but you image our humanity in that union of the two which you have worked in a man. You have veiled the Godhead in a cloud, in the clay of our humanity. Only your love could so dignify the flesh of Adam. And so by reason of this immeasurable love I beg, with all the strength of my soul, that you freely extend your mercy to all your lowly creatures.

Tips Are Owed, They’re Not a Favor.

“Why Restaurants Are Eliminating Tipping“, proclaims a news article headline. The claims include the ideas, that it promotes bad service, it’s an obsolete concept, and is unnecessary because of the living wage movement.

Restaurant owners are certainly entitled to their point of view, but they are probably poorly served by latching onto “living wage”. But workers have a right to their own direct relationship with customers. Their independent legitimacy as professionals doesn’t have to be dependent upon permission from restaurant owners.

Early twentieth century Britain saw the rise of a national movement, growing out of Pope Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum (New Things), called distributism. This was based on the idea that gigantic business and gigantic government were colluding to restrict the freedom of the common people. The archtypical common man, Jones, could only have economic security if he owned his own property and, even if he had to work for another, more powerful person, his ultimate goal needed to be, self-employment. (Coincidentally, the age of cottage industries has been criticized for nothing more than inefficiency, which was “relieved” by the rise of centralized factories during the industrial revolution.)

My chief criticism of “living wage” is that it has the potential to intrude a class of regulators into the economic life of professional service workers. Progressives feel that government is intrinsically enlightened, and must regulate small business and, coincidentally, small workers.

Whether or not this plays out in the long run, uncritical calls for “living wage” ignore the fact that the first obstacle is the heightening of a conflict of interests between small business owners and workers.

I religiously practice tipping because I believe that tips are the property of the workers. I’m not doing them a favor, I owe them the tip for work that they perform. If I didn’t pay my fair tip, I would be defrauding workers of their wages, “a crime, the blood of which calls out of the ground for vengeance.”

Workers at L & L Hawaiian Bar-B-Que were somewhat bemused to see me bringing in a small tip without ordering anything. I didn’t have cash during a previous visit, and I was only paying what I owed.

If I can’t afford to tip, I shouldn’t be patronizing a restaurant. I should be going to the store, taking my own food home and preparing it for myself. Visiting a restaurant is a luxury; if it’s one that I can’t afford, I should refrain from it.

I’m committing a travesty against fundamental justice by omitting my tip. But I certainly don’t need Progressives taking away my freedom by raising prices. The principle of justice, which is only giving people what they’re intrinsically due by their inalienable nature, isn’t something that survives governmentalization.

Unbelievers call it reality. Believers call it hell.

Trent Horn of the Catholic Answers group is very respectful to people of all persuasions, so much does he respect them that he credits them with fine intelligence by sometimes challenging their presumptions…always respectfully and with affirmation.

But that leaves me out, because Trent only talks to unbelievers and pro-choicers. They always have a jolly time. The Catholic Answers radio callers (3-5 weekdays Pacific Time) nearly always leave with an affirmed feeling of having been heard and listened to, and sometimes also with a new thought or two. It seems it’s only real, dedicated spoil-sports who leave on a bummer.

You pretty much already know what unbelievers think about the God-free reality zone, which to them is everywhere and all times, all 11 dimensions of the multiverse. What they may not know, though, is what believers believe about it—that God so loves everyone, that if they decide they don’t want his friendship forever, he makes a special reserved place where they don’t suffer eternally with his presence.

Unfortunately this also means that he can’t protect them from the eternal consequences of their actions. This life is a trial run, practice, for what we will become forever as we are born into eternal life. Now, belief in the absolute relativity of evil and good is a completely different thing from unbelief in God. Many fine atheists and agnostics would find nothing objectionable about Egyptian or High Plains Native American belief in a crossroads at the Milky Way where hearts are weighed and those heavy with personal evil against other people sink down into a bottomless pit. Usually its some ancient spirit grandmother or a dog-god who does the weighing.

Believers are free to believe that its our own souls that will reproduce every mote and nuance of our moral lives, in a faithful 4-D touch & smellivision rendering of our personal history; on a last day that is as long as all reality; in which every sentient being, corporeal and incorporeal, humans and disembodied spirits, will fully see how just the Weigher of Hearts was, how unreservedly generous, giving us fully every help we could need and use to do right by others.

Believers have a chief path to that God-free zone: their marriage beds. This should be the gymnasium trampoline in which they exercise their way up to the eternal Olympics of Love in heaven. But if they hold out their hands in STOP!!! to God, he won’t force his way in. Then they are free to enter eternal life permanently in that condition after a lifetime of saying “I DON’T give you all of myself”, including fertility, to their life partners and to the God who wants to afford them the ultimate dignity not even granted to disembodied intelligences, making them co-creators of beings who will never go out of existence.

This is the main route for people who consider themselves believers to enter the God-free zone.